Is the Glass Ceiling a myth?

Despite the provocative headline that got you this far, I'm sure there's something to it.

So few women top executives exist that I'm sure there's some "boys club" reason behind it in the board rooms of major corporations where, not coincidentally, there are relatively few women.

But what about female line workers: the female clerks, saleswomen, scientists and engineers. Not the woman who aspires to being the CEO, but the woman who, like most men, just wants to earn a living.

I've often wondered about the statistics and have yet to find an answer to this question: are the statisticians comparing apples to apples or apples to oranges?

Here's what I mean:

Most men are ready to travel or even relocate away from friends and family if it will improve their career opportunities. I strongly suspect that while many woman are also ready to improve their careers in this way, most women are not.

I strongly suspect that many women still head toward careers in line with natural feminine inclinations to nurture: teaching, nursing, veterinary care and assistantship jobs, art and craft-oriented jobs.

Add to this some of the disadvantages of women in the workplace such as, greater absenteeism (female health and family commitment reasons), more likely to be a smoker (less likely to give up a break in a crisis situation), and less likely to accept a career move if it means leaving office friends behind, and...

...I wonder what the stats about advancement opportunities and pay would look like if one compared the women who were more like men against their male counterparts.

Your experience is very different from mine :). I have several friends who are now working moms. They love their careers and their kids and they're fantastic at both. I agree that there are many different reasons why women do or don't work, but I don't know that those who want careers are rare exceptions these days.

I'm not saying anything that's refutable with an anecdote. I'm making generalizations and your response is basically "I know a contrary case"? Your several friends may be fantastic at both, but are they ready to pull their kids out of school without regard to the impact on them in order to pursue a career advancement in another state? If so, then maybe your several friends are more fantastic at their careers than at parenting. :)

I was simply responding to Jessica's personal experience here unseen. When people offer generalizations based on their own experience, I think it's fair to expand the discussion with other perspectives.

And yet you gave me a window into your thinking, and I felt it fair to respond to that.

BTW, don't forget that in my OP I granted that there is an obvious and serious problem (a glass ceiling) when it comes to women assuming the highest offices in business. My entire discussion is related to female line workers who just want to earn a living.

I don't think it's really fair to say the ceiling only exists in cutthroat business. I also don't think you're being as unbiased as you'd like to think you are. Sarah also offered personal experience in her response, but only I received your demeaning remark about "my thinking." Could this be because her view is closer to your own opinion?

are they ready to pull their kids out of school without regard to the impact on them in order to pursue a career advancement in another state?

But your point is that men will be more willing to re-locate - are you suggesting they relocate without their families, or are they taking their families with them? I don't see how either would be any better for these kids.

This is something a responsible couple will work out on their own through negotiation and with their kids' welfare in mind. Couples at least have the option of providing a stay-at-home parent to soften the blow, even if they don't take it. Usually when a couple says they can't do it, it's with an unspoken "and maintain the lifestyle we want."

It's more of an ethical question for the single mom who both wants to advance her career and wants the best for her children. Not only will the kids have to adjust to a new setting, make new friends, etc., but they will likely either become latchkey, day care, or babysat kids.

I know from personal experience that what goes on in a day care center is not always something of which one would approve, more so the less one can afford to pay. One day care center offered weekly swimming lessons, which we gladly paid for. After we had moved our daughter to another one, it came out the the swimming instructor was fired for being a little too, shall we say, physically familiar with some of the girls. We're talking 2-4 year old kids.

Ditto for babysitters. Our daughter was abused by two sitters. I remember that when our daughter said that she didn't like this one sitter (a 15 or 16 yr old girl who lived a few houses down the street and came with references) because "I don't want to play the pee pee game anymore," we canceled the sit and called in someone we knew much better. The other sitter was verbally and psychologically abusive. Any child that can have a stay-at-home parent is better off. Whenever parents can provide that luxury, I feel it's the only responsible thing to do.

But we aren't discussing single moms and daycare atrocities. Or single dads for that matter. (I'm sorry about your personal experiences)

However, a Glass Ceiling is only encountered when it is "bumped against". If women weren't trying to get past a certain level in their companies they wouldn't find any resistance. They are trying. In numbers, evidently, or the term "Glass Ceiling" wouldn't be so well known.

A stay at home parent is a luxury in this economic climate, not the "norm" it once was. To be selective on gender within that, seems churlish.